Here’s a great example of how the major studios occasionally tried to grab some of Universal’s extremely profitable horror pie, but were too embarrassed and sniffy to really go for it. First, most of their horror movies, like this one, were themselves tepid at best. They really felt monsters in particular were just beneath them. So you make a horror movie, but sort of at arm’s length, and then this is how you promoted it. Good work, 20th Century Fox.
This continued well into the ’50s, as with Jack Warner himself trying to sabotage the production of Them! because he was embarrased his namesake studio was stooping to monster movies. Ironically, this last minute budgetary cutback helped make the film a classic and it was Warner Bros’ number one movie that year.
